Month: April 2016

These day’s, since becoming a Vegan, I hardly go a day without making something new from the food I intercept or save before it’s about to get binned!

Personally I think becoming vegan has given me a whole lease of life when it comes to cooking because you can’t just grab any old thing from the freezer or cupboards. It has to be well thought out beforehand! To be fair, I find it a bit hard, especially when my staple diet used to be jacket potato’s with cheese, cheese on toast, cheesy pasta or a pizza!

Can you see the re-occurring theme here?

I loved cheese. Yet since deciding that my diet shouldn’t include harming any other living thing, cheese is now not so important and no longer figures in my cooking repertoire anymore!

Instead i get to sample the delights of new foods such as the wonderfully tasty and nutritious Bok Choy! (collected just today in fact!)

I’ll not bore you with it’s beauty other than the fact it’s highly ranked as one of the best vegetables to eat, it’s got 21 good nutrients and rich in Omega 3, zinc and so much more. Oh and the fact that it’s absolutely to die for and so is this stir-fry!

Firstly chop the bok choy into thin, small slices. Chop the tomato into quarters. Slice the mushrooms in even, thin pieces. Peel the garlic and dice it in small pieces.

Now place all the chopped vegetables in the frying pan with the extra light olive oil, sesame oil and salt. Turning the heat to high-medium high. Once heated add the soy sauce, onion powder, garlic powder and paprika. Stir and cook the vegetables 6-8 minutes.

After the vegetables have been cooking for 6-8 minutes dd the cooking wine, stir and cook for another 2 minutes and turn the heat off.

Yes, before you ask ALL of the above ingredients I intercepted before going into bins!

Having never in my life even seen lemon grass, let along received it in the palm of my hands I was overjoyed – yet rather perplexed – to have the opportunity to see what I could do with this treat.

My first thought had to be a Thai dish because that was the only thing I’d ever associated lemon grass with….I could be wrong of course, but as I’d never cooked a Thai dish before I was more than up for it!

Then I came upon this beautiful post by Chilli & Mint and hey presto this beautiful dish was born!

So what do you think? Up for it? You can omit a few of the ingredients if you don’t have them, I tend to add a few bits here and there and adjust to whatever I have in my cupboards or that I’ve saved so don’t stick to it 100% if you don’t have the stuff!

Firstly, slice the shallots and then heat them in the oil in a deep pan, not too hot mind. Add the salt and then fry on a low heat until they soften.

Add the garlic and ground ginger. Add the chillies, lemon grass and turmeric. Then add the chopped tomato’s, then the butternut squash and sweet potato chunks.

Now add the stock, soy sauce and the coconut milk and bring it to a gentle simmer for around 20 mins or so, the vegetables should then have soften by the end of the 20 minutes. Don’t over cook the vegetables as you won’t want it to end up all mushy, then add the sweetcorn.

Lastly turn off the heat and add the spinach so it all mixes up nicely.

Stand back and enjoy the beautifully colourful dish you’ve just created!

As last bit of colour and flavor, chuck in any parsley or coriander that you have moping about the kitchen.

Yep you’ve guessed it we’ve got loads of banana’s again. This time they are all really over-ripe – which means they are really REALLY tasty!

Because, as you know, I hate waste…..I also LOVE breakfast! So if I was going to be eating a good hearty breakfast, then the banana’s had to be used!

Plus as we are always getting these babies; I wanted to find something that you’d use too 🙂

These are soooo tasty; that tasty I’ve been having them every few days – either for breakfast or for desert! As a new found vegan, it’s not been that easy to replace the donuts I loved or the milk fueled puddings I used to adore! So this is a great replacement!

Mix the flour, baking powder, soda and sugar in a bowl. Then mash the banana with a fork in another bowl and stir the flour mixture into it. Heat the frying pan to medium hot, coating the area with oil (bottom of the pan).

Once it’s warm enough (starts to bubble slightly), scoop a tablespoon of the mixture into the pan and flatten it slightly. Fry one side until it’s a medium brown colour and then flip over and do the other side. Once both sides are cooked you can lay on a sheet of kitchen paper to soak up any excess oil and then serve.

I served mine with a drizzle of maple syrup, but you can leave it as it is or add whatever topping you fancy!

I came across this after we’d intercepted a load of courgettes. Not one for knowing what to use courgettes for – other than in my tomato gratin – this popped up via a wonderful blog called ‘House and Garden’.

So far I’ve experimented with recipes which have quite a few herbs and spices – as coming from a ‘non-cooking’ back ground I felt it was about time I used more than just salt and pepper – this recipe however has chilli flakes and/or raw red chilli’s (whatever you prefer).

p.s if you’re not one for really hot spicy food, stick to the chilli flakes – my lips were red raw after using the raw chilli’s!

What you’ll need:

(this will serve 2)

a splash of oil
about 200g spaghetti
2 courgettes
1 red chilli or a shake or two of chilli flakes
a dash of lemon juice (fresh or bottled)
2 cloves of garlic (cos 1 just isn’t enough!)

What you’ll need to do:

(using a wok if you have one!)

Cook your pasta according to instructions, or until the spaghetti sticks to your kitchen tiles (throwing them at the walls and they stick, means they are done!)

Whilst they are cooking, slice the courgette length-ways or using a potato peeler so you get long strips of courgette. Heat the oil in the wok (or similar) and fry them over a medium heat along with the garlic and the chili – then the dash of lemon juice. Fry them all together for around 3 minutes, or until the courgette is soft and all the flavors gathered together.

Serve on the bed of spaghetti and add chopped parsley if you fancy it!

If you’ve been following me on our ‘saving waste’ journey through what I do at The Real Junk Food Project Portsmouth you’ll know for a fact that there isn’t a week that goes by that we don’t get a bunch of banana’s! They are probably one of the main things we receive each week and it not only annoys me greatly, it actually still does excite me!

Why?

Cos I get to do wonderfully delicious dishes like this curry. Because, it’s just fantastic to make meals with fruits and vegetables that you’d not normally consider eating. Banana’s, when they are brown and very over-ripe are when they are at their best, and in this curry they work wonders next to the protein packed red lentils.

This dish was a real hit at our Monday Night Cafe Night, and we reckon you’ll be making it at home once you get a hold of this recipe!

I know this seems a lot but it’s really just herbs and spices, you don’t need to much of anything else to be fair!

What you’ll need to do:

On a medium heat fry the onion, pepper, mustard seeds and garlic until soft and brown with a little olive oil. In a separate bowl mix the almond, lime juice, garam masala, chili powder, cumin, curry, coriander, turmeric and with a tiny bit of warm water to make a paste. Then add this to the onions and garlic, along with the tomato puree. Mix it all well, letting all the flavors come together.

Next slowly stir in the coconut cream over a low heat until it starts to thicken, then add the red lentils and half the banana’s. Leave to simmer for around 30 minutes and add any stock if you think it’s getting too thick. After 30 minutes add the rest of the banana’s and simmer for another 30 mins (if needed) and then serve on some lovely basmati rice with some pitta bread or naan.

Believe me, you’ll never see banana’s quite the same again after eating this!